Carleton Mitchell Collection

Manuscripts Collection 250

Overview of the Collection

Repository:

G. W. Blunt White Library, Mystic Seaport

Creator:

Mitchell, Carleton, 1910-

Title:

Carleton Mitchell Collection

Dates:

1921-1980

Extent:

ca. 1000 items

Abstract:

Correspondence, yacht construction specifications, magazine and newspaper articles, logbooks, charts, drafts of books and articles, scrapbooks, notebooks, personal papers, photographs, negatives, photo albums, and other materials, reflecting Mitchell’s activities in American yachting, sailing, and boating, including his participation in the Newport Bermuda Race, Royal Ocean Racing Club’s transatlantic race, America’s Cup trials, and others, and his voyages throughout the Caribbean and around the world. Vessels represented include the yawls CARIBEE and FINISTERRE and powerboats SANS TERRE, LAND’S END, and COYABA.

Identification:

Coll. 250

Biography of Carleton Mitchell, 1910-

In a 1986 autobiographical article for Yachting, Carleton Mitchell wrote:

“Somewhere around ten, when asked what I wanted to do when I grew up, my mother has said I answered, ‘I want to sail and write about it.’ In later life, I have been lucky in making that boyhood wish come true-with a measure of power boating thrown in.”

Born in New Orleans, Louisiana on August 24, 1910. Mitchell’s first deep water experience came in 1932 after dropping out of his Junior year at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio to sail aboard the TEMPTRESS. After a short stint in the retail business, he moved to the Bahamas and became a self-taught photographer, and also worked as a publicity photographer for The Bahamas Development Board. His work in photography continued when he enlisted in the U. S. Navy and organized and directed the U. S. Navy Combat Photography Unit from 1942-1945.

In 1946 Mitchell purchased CARIB (John Alden’s MALABAR XII) and sailed throughout the Caribbean, afterwards writing his first article for “National Geographic Magazine” and his first book, “Islands to Windward”

His next boat was the 58-foot centerboard yawl CARIBEE, designed by Phil Rhodes. With her Mitchell crossed Sweden via the Gota Canal. In 1952 they completed the Royal Ocean Racing Club’s Transatlantic Race, a voyage which became the subject of his book, “Passages East” (1953). Mitchell eventually won three SORC championships, three consecutive Newport to Bermuda Races, two Chesapeake Bay YRA High Point Trophies and navigated aboard the 12-Meter WEATHERLY for the early trials of the 1958 America’s Cup.

In 1954 he acquired the Olin Stephens-designed centerboard yawl FINISTERRE. Most noted for her unprecedented three wins of the Bermuda Race, Mitchell also sailed FINISTERRE to Gibraltar, and then along the African and European coast to Portofino, Italy. Stateside, he poked into Chesapeake gunkholes with the MUDHEN.

In 1968 Mitchell switched to power, purchasing SANS TERRE, a Grand Banks 42. He cruised around Hong Kong and powered from Los Angeles through the Panama Canal and up to Miami, a 16,000 mile voyage with many detours, lasting three years. LAND’S END was Mitchell’s next power cruiser, and in 1973 Mitchell designed and built his third and final cruiser, the COYABA.

Throughout this time Carleton Mitchell wrote about and photographed his travels, his work appearing regularly in magazines such as “Sports Illustrated”, and “Boating and Yachting”. He also wrote several more books including; “Yachtsman’s Camera” (1950), “Beyond Horizons: Voyages of Adventure and Discovery” (1953), “Summer of the Twelves” (1959), “Isles of the Caribbees” (1966), and “The Wind Knows No Boundaries: Cruises Near and Far” (1971).

Carleton Mitchell’s chronicle represents a resource of major significance for our knowledge of American yachting and boating during the last half of this century. Indeed, the quality and extent of his work insures that his life and love of sailing shall be known to generations yet to come.

Restrictions

Index Terms

This collection is indexed under the following headings in the catalog of the G. W. Blunt White Library. Researchers desiring materials about related topics, persons or places should search the catalog using these headings.